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Baekjin notices when Seongje finally comes back to himself. When the haziness in his eyes lifts away and that typical sharpness shines through again. When his sluggish, weak movements gain a bit of tension. When Seongje realizes what's happening.
Baekjin also notices the way Seongje tries to hide it. How he still lets himself be moved around, easy and pliant but just the slightest more intentional. How he tries to mimic his speech from before, soft words with a slurred edge to them.
How Seongje still leans into his touch.
He tilts his head into Baekjin's hand when Baekjin cups it to steady him and wipes his bloody cheek with the other. His eyes flicker to Baekjin's face, and when Baekjin looks back, Seongje attempts the slow, innocent blink of someone still under. But there's shock there, like he can't quite believe it.
He seems determined to let himself dream though. He snuggles closer to Baekjin, slotting his body to fit better and pushing his cheek more firmly into his palm.
Baekjin doesn't comment on it. He does let his hand linger though.
Then he checks the rest of Seongje's body. Smoothes salve over his bruises - ribs, elbows, and chest. Bandages up his cuts, along his arms and knees. A splint for two fingers that he's sure are fractured. He works his way back up to Seongje's neck.
There's a bloody bite on the back of it, nearer to his shoulder. Baekjin takes his time cleaning it with an alcohol doused cotton pad, holding Seongje tighter around his chest when he flinches at the sting. He traces the ruined flesh with the tip of his finger, following the indents of his own teeth. Seongje sighs.
He hadn't meant to go this deep. But he doesn't regret it.
When he's finished with that, he starts on the final part.
Lower. Between Seongje's legs. The mess there is the one he's most reluctant to get rid of.
Seongje's breath hitches when Baekjin spreads his legs and dips his hand between. The focus in his eyes stutters, glazing over, but never stray from watching Baekjin. It's almost like he doesn't want to blink, doesn't want to miss a second of this.
Baekjin is gentle. Scoops out the cum he'd pumped into Seongje an hour ago with slow, dragging pulls of his curled fingers. Maybe deliberately aiming for that spot he'd just familiarized himself with, the one he'd pounded swollen while Seongje gasped and writhed beneath him. Maybe he toys with Seongje down there for too long, amused at his cocks weak twitch. He feels heat curling in his own gut again.
But he quells the urge. Turns clinical instead, wiping him down then moving off the bed, ignoring Seongje's disappointed whine. As if Seongje can take anymore in his state.
Baekjin goes to the kitchen and grabs painkillers and a water bottle, prepares it, then hands them to Seongje with a meaningful look. Seongje starts sipping, slow, wincing at the pain, watching as Baekjin cleans up.
Baekjin steps into the bathroom and tosses away the crumpled gauze and wrappers. Catches his own reflection in the mirror and pauses. Somehow, he looks better than he has in months. The dark circles he thought were permanent have eased, and his face is nearly glowing with an absurdly healthy flush. The pain in his arm and leg seem nonexistent. Even his eyes look brighter.
Was it all because of what happened?
.................
Not too long ago, Seongje had stumbled to his apartment, uninvited. Bloody and bruised, he'd slumped outside the door, curling into a ball, shaking. Not even a knock to announce himself. Just the thud of his body as he passed out.
Baekjin had opened the door reluctantly, unwilling to let anyone into his domicile. But he couldn't have Seongje bleeding out right there. So he pulled him inside, dumping him on the couch. Seongje stirred.
In a low voice, he threatened Seongje. Asked what the hell he thought he was doing, showing up like this. Promised Seongje wouldn't think about doing anything like this ever again.
Seongje had only reached into his jacket and produced the hard drive Baekjin had been after for weeks.
Baekjin never ordered him to go after that gang alone. That was suicide. But Seongje had done it anyways.
Even after what Baekjin did to him. Even after their fight. Even after everything that happened, with Eunjang, and Baku, and Choi. Why would he do that to himself - why did he always do this -
Why did he always come back after Baekjin pushed him away?
He hated it.
Hated how easy Seongje grinned at him, nothing like how he smiled at other people. Hated how Seongje watched him everytime they were in the same room, his body attuned to Baekjin even if his eyes weren't on him. Hated how obviously he wore his heart on his sleeve, the yearning in on his face so obvious and overwhelming Baekjin tried to never look back.
He never understood it. He'd spent so long with walls built up around him, with an ice cold demeanor that sent every person scurrying away, and yet all Seongje ever did was try to break through. Ignored every warning, every kick, every harsh word. Everyone else had gotten the message. Everyone else had left.
So why hadn't he?
Seeing Seongje more beaten than he'd ever seen him, face swelling and breathing ragged, back once again, offering the item like a prize, something in Baekjin finally snapped.
He tossed the hard drive to the table and crashed his mouth into Seongje's, biting and snarling, too lost in the crash of emotions he'd been holding back. Too angry that it felt like Seongje finally won, doing something like this, forcing Baekjin to admit what he didn't want to. Seongje only moaned, loud and relieved, and wrapped his arms around Baekjin and let himself be devoured.
Even when Baekjin fucked him too hard, when Baekjin dug his fingers into his bruised ribs, when Baekjin shoved his face into the pillow until he sagged from lack of air, Seongje still asked for more. He spread his legs wider, fumbled back for Baekjin's hand to hold, kept trying to turn and look at him until Baekjin finally flipped him over.
He started crying, at some point. Maybe when Baekjin's hand was on his cock, stripping it right after he already came, forcing him through another one almost immediately. But he took it. Let Baekjin keep using him, far past his own limits, until his already exhausted body slipped into a softer state for all the abuse it was being put through. His mind went too, the clever, violent edges of it breaking away to an accepting, tender thing.
Seongje still fought to keep his eyes open, to keep watching Baekjin, his hands desperately slipping around Baekjin's neck as he clung to him. Kept chanting his name, like he knew no other word. Never told him to stop, and with every second that passed of their bodies sliding against each other, Seongje's face only grew more open, more devoted, more loving.
Baekjin only stopped when he'd come so much that Seongje's expression finally stopped making him hard. When he'd finally asserted to himself that this creature who had already decided he belonged to Baekjin, was indeed in his possession and thoroughly marked with his claim.
He slipped his arms around Seongje and pulled him close, sighing when Seongje returned the embrace weakly.
"Seongje." Baekjin whispered, then again. "Seongje."
Seongje didn't move, except to nod against him and hum through his wrecked throat.
"Baekjin." He answered, just his name and nothing more. It ignited one last surge in Baekjin, one more blinding rush that had him sinking his teeth into Seongje's neck as hard as he could.
Seongje didn't even struggle. He hugged Baekjin tighter, gasping once more, "Baekjin."
The anger in Baekjin broke, giving way to the flinching edges of his heart. He carried Seongje to his bedroom, and began cleaning him up.
.................
He steps back into the bedroom. Seongje's eyes flutter open and his whole body jolts with the affect of someone who was trying to stay awake and caught themselves slipping.
Baekjin quickly joins him on the bed and pulls Seongje's body to his again, before Seongje can reach for him and strain himself. Seongje still squirms in his arms, until Baekjin turns him so they're face to face.
"Better?" Baekjin asks, low, studying Seongje's swollen eye.
"Mhm." Seongje sighs, tucking his face into the crook of Baekjin's shoulder and tangling their legs together.
Baekjin holds him until he falls asleep, until his breathing smoothes and he slumps fully, his hold on Baekjin loosening.
The sleeping pill from the water should be working.
Baekjin slips away without stirring him, back to the living room. He picks up the hard drive, expression cold and calculating, then grabs what he needs.
He finds the group easy enough. They've recovered from whatever Seongje did to them, but slower for it, still hanging around as they try to fix up. Baekjin doesn't give them a chance.
By the time he's finished, not a single other person is left standing. Barely any sounds from the unconscious bodies. Baekjin himself is far less hurt than Seongje was, but it's exactly because Seongje softened them up first. Whatever was soothing his traumatized limbs from before is gone though, and the crippled ache ripples through him.
He cleans out their safe, and then sets fire to stack of papers in the corner of their building. It'll spread fast enough.
When he gets back and finishes cleaning himself up, Seongje is still there, sleeping peacefully. Baekjin arranges his body carefully with his own, slipping his arms around him again and pressing his lips to his forehead.
He took far too long to do this. He knows that. He knows he doesn't deserve this. But if Seongje is here and willing and capable of taking the full brunt of Baekjin - and hasn't he proved that over and over again? - then Baekjin will give himself over too.
He closes his eyes and lets the rhtyhm of Seongje's steady breath lull him in sleep.